Claire's Change
by RobinGabriella
Summary: After being captured by Bishop, Claire awakens in a dark room. What are Bishops plans, and what role does Claire play in them? More importantly, will her humanity survive it?
1. Chapter 1

Claire woke up in darkness. No windows, no lights, not even a visible door. The floor was warm beneath her body, but was hard as stone. A constant pounding rhythm in her head kept her from sleeping again, though in any case she didn't want to. Waking up in strange dark places is never a good sign.

She pulled herself up into a sitting position, yanking her borrowed trousers up, then falling back, dizzy. Her head felt like her brain had been round in a blender. She touched her palm to her neck, and it came away wet.

"Crap," she whispered, her voice dry, maybe from screaming.

"Silence, child!" snapped a curt voice from the shadows. "Amelie's little toy is most displeasing." Claire squeaked pathetically, realizing it was Bishop.

"N-no!" she squealed, trying to push herself back up.

"Oh, yes, I do think so. You're dying, child, and there's only one cure." He said maliciously. Wherever they were, it was far away from a hospital. Then it struck Claire like a freight train.

"Amelie wouldn't."

"She will. She loves you far too much for your own good."

"I'm just her – her –" Claire struggled for words "servant! I'm not worth that much to her! She'd let me die."

"She'll be here very soon. We'll see just what she does. Mark my words, child, you'll join us soon enough. You want to like too much. I've tasted it." He hissed. Claire heard his teeth clicking in a malicious grin. Horrible pictures of his face, smeared with her blood, poured through her imagination.

"You're wrong!! You bastard, where's Shane!" Claire screamed. Bishop slapped her across the face, leaving stars shooting across her vision as her head cracked painfully against the floor.

"Insolent child! You think i don't know my own daughter?" he spat, then vanished through the portal in the wall, a darker shape disappearing into a sea of darkness. Or that might have been a mild concussion.

Claire slipped into sleep, letting the darkness take her.


	2. Chapter 2

Claire's subconscious ran wild. Shane's face loomed in front of her, the biggest and clearest image in the swirling darkness of her mind. Its eyes were full of tears, mouth pouting slightly.

"You did it. You're not Claire anymore." He whispered, turning away from her. She grabbed out helplessly, but he moved to fast. The dark around them warped and twisted into a maze, massive green hedges towering over Claire and Shane. Shane walked around a corner, and she ran after him.

He stood poised on the edge of a cliff. It must have been a 500 meter drop. A few straggly trees clung to the sides, but mostly weedy shrubs lounged in the sandy soil.

"SHANE!" Claire screamed, sprinting towards him. She clasped his arm and pulled him back, falling over on the floor in a heap. She tried disentangled her limbs from his, but his hands grabbed on to her wrists, his face mutated into a grotesque snarl.

"You're dead, bitch," He growled. "You killed Claire."

A knife appeared in his hand, wicked and long. He brought it down, sweeping through the thick air between him and Claire. She screamed as the knife dived in slow motion...


	3. Chapter 3

A scream burst from Claire's throat, muffled by an icy hand.

"Oh, you're finally awake," spoke an ever-calm voice next to Claire. Two glistening points of grey danced in front of her vision, and something cold tapped her face.

"A - Amelie?" Choked Claire.

"This is Bishop's work. Sam – " Amelie's tone was oddly urgent, tapering off into a whisper.

"I think she's –" Claire's hearing cut out "- too late? Shouldn't we –" silence "- change her." Sam's reassuring voice was marred with panic. He and Amelie wore identical looks of shock, almost enough for Claire to forget all about vampires, Morganville and herself, that she would wake up in a couple of hours to her alarm clock before school, and she could tell her parents all about this crazy dream she'd been having. For the last several months.

"What are you -?" Claire coughed out.

"You're too valuable, Claire. You have the answers to the sickness inside your head, and we can't afford to lose you," came Sam's warm voice, slightly shaky around the edges.

"I apologise, Claire. It should never have come to this," whispered Amelie's strained, icy voice.

Cold hands grasped her wrists.

Then it hit her. They were going to make her a vampire, change the foundation of what she was, and tear her away from people she loved, just for this cure?! She tried desperately to protest, but unnaturally strong arms pinned her legs down and her voice wouldn't work.

Two little points of pain stuck into her wrist. Amelie's hair trailed over her face like a crazy vine, her soft lips pressed on the underside of Claire's right wrist. A hand stroked her hair and Amelie's eyes flushed red just as Claire's started going out of focus.

"Hold her head, Sam," Commanded Amelie.

More hands gripped her head and knotted in her hair. Something cold and wet was pressed to her slightly open lips, and Claire took a bit in her mouth before she could stop herself. A warm sensation trickled down her throat, better than anything she'd ever tasted, like molten fire, liquid passion, and knew it was what she wanted, what she would always want, more, more, more...

The liquid was pulled away from her mouth, and Amelie's face came into focus.

No. More than just focus. More like a HD TV, or through a microscope. Every single tiny bit of her face was immaculate, except her light eye makeup which had run in little rivers down Amelie's pale cheeks. She had been crying.

Claire's heart lurched, and she threw herself into Amelie's cold arms, like hugging a rock, then feeling arms around her back smoothing down her rough braid and running comfortingly over her back.

Then it hit.

"What the –" Stuttered Claire.

"Hush, child. You have to get through the portal back to your house. Bishop will probably return." Amelie hissed.

"But -"

"Go! Now!"


	4. Chapter 4

Claire bolted through the portal. So fast she didn't see the wall on the other side.

"Ah, crap," she mumbled. She turned around. Eve was sitting on the couch, her hand frozen in a bag of chips. Her black lips were slightly parted and she didn't appear to be breathing.

"Wha – how – holy –GOD!" Eve spluttered.

"I can explain. Kinda."

"Get explaining, Claire, or I'll have Michael, Shane, Oliver, Jason, the muffin man and six and a half freakin' baby dolphins down here and kick your ass." She said slowly.

Claire started from the beginning and sank down next to the TV. Eve raised her hand like a kid at school.

"Uh, Claire? One question."

"Yeah?"

"How're you going to tell Shane?"

Claire never got to answer that one. Shane came down stairs, almost as if on que.

He looked.

And turned around and walked back up the stairs. Then came Michael.

"What were you THINKING!?" yelled Michael. "You could have died! Amelie could have died! How the hell are you going to tell your PARENTS?!?"

"You know this wasn't exactly my choice!" shouted Claire. She stormed up the stairs and ran into her bedroom, slamming the door. It had barely shut before she fell on her bed, sobbing.


End file.
